Sylvanus of Gischala

So many times during Jesus’ life he dealt with travelers along the highways of Israel. Men and women seemed to drift in and out of his life, perhaps by accident, perhaps not. One of these was Sylvanus, a lawyer of Gischala.

In our day we assume lawyers to be wealthy, and not necessarily trustworthy. Whether these are true today is debatable.

It was the same in Jesus’ time. Neither was necessarily true. Certainly for Salvanus, there was no truth in the charges. He was not a really wealthy man.

Sylvanus was a lawyer, all right. Sylvanus sat at the city gate, along with the other elders of the city. On certain days the group would discuss legal issues of the day. Sometimes the issues were items brought by the community. Property. Inheritance.

Other times the issues were theoretical in nature. What does it mean to adopt? What is the meaning of faith? What is true religious practice?

Sylvanus was sometimes paid by some person to represent them before the council at the city gate. The questions presented might be matters of faith, or religion, or military action, or government. Whatever the question, when the call came to serve, Sylvanus tried desperately to find the truth among the issues. It was a personal thing with him. Sometimes he won, sometimes he lost. Sometimes the little group at the gate of Gischala could only reach some compromise.

His home town, Gischala, was northwest of Capernaum, about fifteen miles. It was really just a settlement of a couple hundred souls. Sheepherders, traders, craftsmen, farmers. Several families were quite poor.

Sylvanus was a farmer, grapes and figs and olives, mostly. Just a few acres. His real interest was the law, and how it could be used and adjusted to benefit those who called on him for help.
Pyramid of the law

The law of the day was complex. It rested on a sort of triangle or pyramid of statutes. The three sides of the triangle were the government, the temple organization as it reached out from Jerusalem, and the military. The Military was recognized as being outside the government because it raised its own funds by conscription and attachment, and usually chose its own battles.

Each of these had its own set of laws, established by its powerful people. The role played by people like Sylvanus was simple. Stay out of the way of the laws established by the government, the temple and the military. There was no democracy left from the ideals of the Greeks.

Democracy would not be seen again until the time of Jefferson and Franklin and Washington.
The assumption was made that every person accepted the points that held the civilization together: A relationship with the Lord, a need for corporate defense, and a need for community action such as roads, walls, and wells.

Not in the pyramid, though, were two other pieces that you and I expect to be at the center of law: Business to business matters, and individual rights. Fend for yourself was the essential law in both instances.

I don’t mean to say that businesses and individuals had no protections in the law. Not at all. It was just that neither businesses nor individuals had any real possibility of claiming victory against the government, the military, or the temple.

But between business and business, or individual and individual, there were strong laws. This is how the lawyers of the day spent their time at the city gate. There were property matters, and damages. There were criminal actions, and minor problems. There were health issues such as leprosy and blindness. All of these required straight thinking by the most respected minds of the community. Any of these could be brought by any person to the council of elders.

Training for a legal career was personally motivated. A man had four primary methods of learning. Observation, reading, reciting or discussing the law, and trial and error. Sylvanus had carefully followed all these throughout his career.

By watching carefully the community around himself, Sylvanus could see the impact of the law on people. He learned to read at the synagogue by reading from the Torah and the scrolls of the prophets. Sylvanus made presentations of legal issues and comments to his friends and family, and eventually to the council. Then he began to work through the trial and error procedures brought to the council. He questioned and contemplated. He composed solutions, and re-wrote them. He tried to find the truth.

It is here that Sylvanus’ life becomes really interesting to us in the current century. Sylvanus’ life did not become so famous in his day as that of Jesus, or Nero, or Paul, or so many others. Sylvanus really has been almost forgotten.

It is really by reaching back another thousand years, past Jesus, that we find the real reason for Sylvanus’ impact on American and world life today.

Very few people know anything about Amos. He is one of my all-time favorites from the Bible.
Amos lived most of his life in the hills north of the Sea of Galilee, north of Gischala and Capernaum. His work was as a shepherd and farm laborer. He says he was not a prophet, but he is certainly remembered as one.

Some three or four hundred years before Amos, in about 1100 B.C., Moses and Aaron brought the Hebrew people through the wilderness toward Jericho.

But there came a time when things went badly. Starvation was setting in, and the people were becoming discouraged.

Moses and Aaron took the position that things were going badly because some of the people were doubting the team of Moses and Aaron. It was the sort of stand we have seen in Richard Nixon and Joseph Stalin and other leaders of the world. We have even seen it in churches and Christian denominations.

The man Korah and some others then challenged Moses and Aaron on their words. Korah could not accept that the Lord had appointed them commanders and priests of the entire nation. They appeared at the tents of Moses and Aaron one day with a group of supporters.
The man Korah and some others challenged Moses and Aaron on their words that the Lord had appointed them commanders and priests of the entire nation. What happened?

We are not really certain, but it appears that Moses and Aaron had Korah and his people killed and buried in the desert.

Over the next centuries, a group of rural thinkers, mostly from the north, established a group movement of prophets. These people found constant ways to challenge whatever government was in power at the time. They usually called the government and the people to return to a life of justice and righteousness. Amos became one of these in about 750 B.C.

Sylvanus also became one of the Sons of Korah at the time of Jesus. Northern Palestine was then, as now, filled with men and women who were willing to risk their lives for justice and righteousness. How did this change our lives?

Sylvanus often made business and religious trips to Capernaum. In those days, the custom was that visitors to a town who sat among the elders of their own communities at their own city gate could sit with the elders of the destination community.

So Sylvanus became a well known and accepted member of the elders’ group at the Capernaum gate.

The problems Sylvanus and the other elders tried to deal with were many-sided and deep. The most troubling of these were the spiritual matters. These were not matters of temple power or strategies. They were matters of the relationship between individuals and the Holy One. Then as now, the most pressing of these questions was the matter of eternal life.

They could ask and answer questions. They could make comments. They could share in any refreshments that were passed around. Figs. Grapes. Raisins. Bread. Tea. Wine.

When he sat with the elders at Capernaum this day, Sylvanus was responding to legal needs for answers. When Jesus came to the city, Sylvanus thought this might be an opportunity to get fresh insight.

Sylvanus did not know much about Jesus. He had only heard rumors about the man. But these rumors were intriguing enough that Sylvanus took them seriously. Because he happened to be in the area of the Sea of Galilee for a few days, he found the opportunity to question Jesus irresistible. Sylvanus could now consider the rumors for himself in the light of the law.

The rumors that Sylvanus wanted to clarify with Jesus were really rather threatening to Galilean society. Indeed, all of the culture of Israel was up for grabs, according to the rumors.
One rumor had it that Jesus intended to change the Ten Commandments. Sylvanus also heard that Jesus had edited the commandments. But Jesus’ editing seemed to be simply quoting old statements of the law. "You shall love Yahweh, your god with all your heart, and mind, and soul and strength. And you shall love your neighbor as yourself."

This was confusing to Sylvanus. How could this be seen as wrong?

Jesus performed work on the Sabbath. But when the work is healing, or performing the ordinary functions of life, like eating, where in the law is that shown to be wrong?

And politically, it was rumored that Jesus would lead a revolt against king or against Rome itself. But Sylvanus looked around at the few men who seemed to walk and talk with Jesus. He could see no evidence of military action, or weapons, or even covert action. There was certainly nothing to cast fear into the heart of the Roman government, the mightiest government and military of the world.

The rumors said Jesus would turn families against each other. Well, maybe. Sylvanus could see how families could disagree with one another about what Jesus was saying. And Jesus did, apparently, ask people to go with him, to walk with him. They might have to leave their families to go with Jesus. He supposed this could be a problem.

The most serious rumor and challenge to Jesus was in the charge that Jesus suggested that they ignore the Temple mandates. That thinking outside the box about salvation would certainly raise questions. If the temple could not define and describe salvation for the people, what would be the center of Israeli life and culture. Even the government and the military and business of the day would face terrible challenges.

Sylvanus could think of only one question he could ask that really brought all these issues and rumors together. If Jesus answered it, Sylvanus would know just what it was that Jesus was about. Sylvanus would know whether Jesus was trying to challenge the law, or the government, or the temple. Perhaps there was no reason to fear the revolt Jesus might have planned.

So Sylvanus worked his way close to Jesus in the crowd. At a quiet moment, Jesus looked straight at Sylvanus. He apparently expected a question or a statement from the learned man. There was something about the eye contact that said that Sylvanus would find some way to walk with Jesus, and Jesus expected.

Sylvanus did not hesitate. He asked Jesus perhaps the basic spiritual question of that day and today. "What must I do to have eternal life?"

Jesus answered with words Sylvanus did not expect. "You have read the law. What does it say in the law?"

The lawyer answered quickly. "You shall love Yahweh, your god, with all your heart, and mind, and soul and strength. And you shall love your neighbor as yourself."

Jesus spoke quietly now. "You are correct. Go and do this. You shall have life."

But Sylvanus was ready. "But, sir, who is my neighbor?"

Again, Jesus apparently had prepared well. He smiled at the question.

"A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho. He fell among robbers. They stripped him and beat him, and fled the scene. They left the man for dead. Now luckily a priest was going down that road. When he saw the man he walked on the other side of the road. Soon a Levite, when he saw the man, walked by on the other side of the road. But a Samaritan, walking home from Jerusalem through Jericho, came to the man. When the Samaritan saw the man, he had compassion on the victim. The Samaritan bound up the wounds. He poured expensive oil and wine on the wounds. Then he sat the man on his own donkey and brought him to the inn in Jericho, the best inn to take care of him. The next day he gave two denarii to the innkeeper.

"Take care of him. If it costs more, I will be back in a few days to pay the bill."

Now Jesus looked Sylvanus in the eye again. "Which of these three, do you suppose, was neighbor to the man who was beaten?"

Sylvanus now was in awe at the thinking of Jesus, and the depth of his commitment to the life of Israel. "The one who showed mercy on the fallen man."

Jesus said to him, simply: "You go and live the same sort of life."

And though Sylvanus returned to Gischala, he walked with Jesus, in spirit, all the remaining days of his life.

Sylvanus accepted the burden of sharing with the trinity the creative genius of the Creator, the redemption of the Christ, and the presence of the Spirit. His act of faith has changed our lives. His question gave Jesus the opportunity to be much more specific with his instructions to us.
"Go, and live the life of the Good Samaritan."

Amen.

What Do You Mean, You Don't Have Time?

What Do You Mean,
Matthew 15:21-28
Karl Evans
2007

Jesus was tired. Every muscle hurt as he trudged the Galilean countryside. The disciples expected a plan from him. They waited in vain for Jesus to share his plans with them. Would he go down into the Decapolis? Would he go north? When did Jesus plan to make his next pilgrimage to Jerusalem, if at all? He was not saying.

The long, hard days of personal ministry were beginning to wear on him. Miles of rough and dusty roads to walk. Even the Roman government, with all its power and money, could not put a decent surface on the roads of the empire. From the British Isles to Pakistan, the great web of highways required constant maintenance.

For Jesus, there was more. His friends and supporters spread the word about him. Soon every villages all over Galilee and the Decapolis expected him to pay them a visit. Unfamiliar beds. All manner of different foods. Insects. Dogs. People. Always more people. Jesus was just tired.

But being tired was not all. Jesus would not have had a problem with that. After all, he was carrying out his mission. The worst was that he was getting frustrated by the unwillingness of people to know and accept his love for them. Many could not believe he had something for them.

Jesus was tired of being rejected. He was sick and tired of being doubted. Tired of being tired. Tired.

Jesus found himself walking the road toward the Mediterranean. He felt the purpose in his heart as he walked. Slowly he was able to move away from others on the road. This was his only means of having some time for himself now.

Walking to the sea coast to visit the resort cities of Tyre and Sidon took about two weeks. It was not such a great distance, from Nazareth to Tyre. Rather, every person he met seemed to want to have some of his time and energy.

Jesus wanted to be in the coastal cities for the sake of the people who lived there. Even more, Jesus needed the rest, the R & R, of the great sea. He might rest on the beaches. He could watch the waves and the tides as he renewed himself by the power of the sea. Even the ships going to and coming from distant lands seem to add an energy to the scene.

It is marvelous what salt spray can do. The roar of even the gentlest surf lapping against the sand or rocks drowns out many sorrows and cares. Sunsets on the ocean on a clear day can cleanse the mind of many things. The finely separating shades of blue and red and orange and gray cleanse the senses of fogginess and doubt.

Jesus even found a little time to go out on the sea in fishing boat with the owner and a few others. For a fisherman from the Sea of Galilee, this was a rare treat. The Mediterranean was even calmer than his home waters. Jesus could relax so well.

Wherever he traveled, Jesus managed to find others to love. Someone always awaited his healing power. This time, Jesus went to the coast to heal himself as well as others. He needed healing in spirit and in mind as well as body.

When Jesus came to the Mediterranean coast to rest, a not-so-strange thing happened. Other people kept coming to him. People who were hurting came to him to be healed. Their timing was always just right. These people who needed healing came to him right at the time Jesus needed healing for his own soul. It never seemed to fail.

One of these was Anya. Anya the Canaanite who came to Jesus with only the last dregs of ethnic hope. Anya the minority in the land of her furthest ancestors came to Jesus.

Anya lived the pitiful life of a native Palestinian. She knew she was looked down upon by the Hebrews themselves. She was abused by the world around herself, but she came to Jesus for healing.

Jesus was tired. Avoiding crowds was not easy, but he needed to be silent. He needed to be relieved of being forced to talk. Those Jews and Gentiles who kept crowding around him made so many demands. They demanded he prove he could solve all their problems by himself. They demanded he heal. They demanded miracles.

Some said he might be the Christ. If he were, he should be able to prove it quickly. Jesus was tired of this game. Everywhere he went, someone else wanted a miracle. Not much of a miracle, mind you. Just make this person wealthy. Make that person win the next election. Make this boy win the big race. Jesus was tired of this.

But Anya needed help. She came to Jesus because she desperately needed help now. Her daughter, Meliq, was a girl possessed.

Meliq was bitter, hostile, struggling against a mother she believed didn't want her. She fought with a mother whom she blamed for Meliq's own Canaanite skin coloring and hair structure. She blamed her mother for this load which hung about her neck like an albatross. This beautiful young woman should have been in her prime. Instead she was bitter about what God had dealt her. The web of anger and resentment aimed at her own mother, at her own blood, made her life a hell.

And Meliq blamed her father, gone though he was. He had disappeared one day with no trace, no direction. It was mostly his fault. He left Meliq and Anya alone.

And Meliq blamed herself. She blamed herself for hurting her own mother. She blamed herself for making life miserable for Anya. The more guilty she felt, the more her hostility came through. When life turned harder for Anya, life became incredibly more difficult for Meliq.

Anya blamed herself for everything. She blamed herself that her husband left. Pressuring him to leave was the last thing she really wanted. He wanted only tenderness and sex and loving support. He was willing to work hard to support Anya and Meliq.

Anya responded to his care and need out of her own bitterness at being trapped. She was trapped forever in a woman's body. Her husband could not stand the rejection of his love, so he left. Now, she was alone and trapped in a Canaanite woman's body.

Anya was trapped as a mother. She was raising a child she wanted and feared and resented. The responsibilities she both demanded and dreaded trapped her. Being an abandoned woman trapped her. Anya was trapped as an abandoned woman in a world that placed no value on such a life.

When her husband left, her real trouble began. Anya began to have trouble with Meliq. Meliq shouldn't have been born. Anya knew it. If only Meliq had not come into this world! Anya's husband could have left easily. No one would have thought too much about it. There would have been far fewer problems.

Anya would not have had to deal with Meliq's hostility and bitter words. Life would have been much easier.

It was a vicious circle. Pressure, hurt, pressure, hurt, pressure, hurt. Anya had to have help from somewhere.

From outside the circle around Jesus, she called in desperation. "Jesus! Jesus!"

Anya began to elbow her way through the crowd to where he stood. "Jesus! Jesus! Master!"

The crowd turned hostile, closing in against her. Some of the Jews tried to keep her from getting ahead of them in their own push to see Jesus. She was Canaanite. This ranked her last in society. She could wait until their needs were met by this prophet.

Jesus struggled within himself. He knew many of this mob did not believe him. These people were only there to heckle or to deride him. There are always those poor souls. They seemed to be without conscience.

Jesus looked through the crowd directly at Anya. His voice was weary. "Anya, right now I don't have time. Right now I've got problems with those of my Israel who think I'm a little crazy. Come back when I have some time. I promise I will try to talk to you later."

By now Anya was close enough to Jesus to look him right in the eye, face to face. She spoke to Jesus as maybe he had never been spoken to before. Her eyes and her voice burned with the fire of desperation as she read him out."

"What do you mean, you don't have time? Don't have the time? If the Son of God does not have the time for me, who does?"

"I need help. I've needed help a long time. All my life. I went to the Temple. I asked for help at the holiest place in the world. The temple priests said they did not have time. They were too busy offering sacrifices to say a prayer for me and my daughter."

"Instead, they said a prayer for the calves they were slaughtering for the sacrifice. They said a prayer for the chickens, and a prayer for the doves. Those jerks said a prayer for the priests, and for more money, but they wouldn't say a prayer for me. They wouldn't say a prayer for my daughter."

Anya didn’t even pause for a breath. "So I went to the synagogue for help. I asked the rabbi who was preaching. I asked the elders who sat listening. I said ‘I need help!’"

"The elders said they were too busy, too busy deciding how many steps they could take on the Sabbath. They said they were busy deciding what kind of theater they could watch."

"They said they were too busy to give a Canaanite woman a cleansing bath of prayer. But they did find time to ask if I had threshed wheat on the Sabbath. They asked if I had brought any money."

"They did ask what I had done wrong. They said I must have done something terribly wrong if my life is so miserable. I have done many things wrong in my life, but could it be the wrongest thing I have done is to believe the people of David might care about me?"

"So I went to the government. I said `I need help.' I said I needed a counselor, and those who speak for God are too busy. Will you help?"

"And the people of the government said `We are too busy. We are too busy writing job descriptions and recruiting counselors to actually provide counseling and care."

"The people of the government said, ‘We are too busy building a pretty chariot which can kill lots of people by running them over without uprooting their flower beds. Too busy giving tax breaks to the wealthy. They must pay the wealthy out of the taxes you pay on your own home. If we don't collect the taxes, how can the government give more money to the wealthy?’"

"They said ‘Go away. We must forget you exist. Pull yourself up by your own bootstraps. If you are poor, you must deserve it. Go and make yourself clean, and then you won't need government aid.'"

Jesus and the others could only stand and listen to the fire in Anya's voice. She chose her cutting words carefully. Then she filled them with the kind of spiritual fire Jesus wished he could match. The pace and passion of her emotions held them to the fire of her voice.

"I went to my neighbors. The people right next door, neighbors for years. They were too busy. They were too busy waiting for Meliq and Anya to die or move out so they could have our home without paying for it."

"Those thieves were not too busy to ask if the house has a good foundation. They were not too busy to make plans to eventually tear the house down and build a duplex, but too busy to help us live now."

"I--I was just about to give up, to find a way to just die. Let everything go. I would have ended everything."

"Then I heard about you. I heard you came to bring Heaven on earth."

"I was glad. I jumped for joy! I had hope because this earth is not the Kingdom of God. It is nothing but hell for me and my daughter. You would help me! I was so happy. So I came."

"Now you say you don't have time for me either! You have to please these people who surround you who are nothing but warts on the skin of life! If you, the Son of God, the Christ, the Son of David, the one sent from Heaven, do not have time for me, then who in Hell does?"

"You don't even see me, do you? Your eyes are fogged over. You're seeing yourself."

"Look at me. I say, look at me! Look in my eyes. Do I exist? Am I real? If I exist, does anyone care?"

A tremor of silence held the crowd. Not even the most uncaring in the crowd could look up.
Finally Jesus looked into her eyes. He did not see her at first, only seeing himself as she had said.

Jesus knew he was caught. He was caught in the very human trap of caring about his own acceptance. Jesus was caught worrying about going to Jerusalem. Jesus was caught wondering what awaited him when he finally would go to Jerusalem.

Jesus knew he was beginning to spend more time caring about trial, more time facing rejection, more time organizing the church than caring for the people around him.

Now he began to find his fire again. Jesus opened himself to her frustrations. "You are right. You have caught me where I cannot escape. You have cast judgement on my love, and on my power, and found it wanting. All right. You are right. You have made me see you."

Jesus continued. "Let me have whatever it is you cannot carry. Let me carry your load. I will do what I can."

And Anya, more gently now, said "Jesus, I have already given you my anger. I don't want it back. I guess you can keep that.

"Jesus, I cannot live with my own impatience. It is a load I cannot bear. And another thing, I have the feeling of being trapped, trapped as a woman. I am trapped as a mother, trapped as a Canaanite. Take this feeling from me. Please Jesus, take it away. Take away the trap of being what I am. I cannot live with it."

Jesus took Anya in his arms, holding her tight. Tears came to four tired brown eyes, tired from seeing each other, and from seeing themselves in each other. While they held, life revealed itself to both.

Jesus said quietly "Meliq will be all right. She is a good child. You and Meliq will have your love for each other. I will carry the load you have given me. At least we will love each other in the way people ought to be loved."

With a last hug, Anya moved away from the crowd on the shore, up the dusty road toward home. Still Jesus' words echoed in her heart, strong words, gentle words, caring and loving words, "You and Meliq will have your love."

As Anya neared her home, she began to make little plans. Plans to clean the house, to spend a little more time with her daughter, to care for someone else. As she walked she wondered how Jesus might actually help her. Well, he could at least just hear her story. That made her wonder about how he worked. It did feel good.

Anya liked the way Jesus said her daughter's name. "Meliq." He gave it such a pleasant note. And when he said "Anya," it was as if he really cared about her.

As she reached out for the latchstring of the door to her tiny home she remembered the love in Jesus’ voice. Jesus had said "Meliq. Meliq. Meliq. Anya. Anya."

Anya liked the way Jesus said the names. As she stepped inside, she was startled by what she remembered now. Anya had not told him either her daughter's or her own name.

Creation

Adam and Eve
by
Karl C. Evans
2007

There was a time God breathed into the Man the breath of life. The first human came to know what it was to be alive. There was a garden to explore. There were stars to watch. There were clouds to consider. There were all good things to do.

But God wanted to share creation with the Man. God wanted to share not only creation itself. God chose to share even creative activity and emotion with the created one. Almost – everything was to be shared. Sharing is very good.

So God paraded all the animals in front of the man to see what the Man would name them. This sharing of names would be very good. They could laugh a little, and dream a little.

One animal the man called `Lion'. Another, the Man called `Dog'. Yet another the Man called `hippo – '...no, not `hippopotamus'. That one he called `rhinoceros'. It looked more like a rhinoceros than a hippopotamus. But there are hippopotamuses and rhinoceri – or is it hippopotami and rhinoceroses?

Finally, all the animals had been named. God looked around, carefully. God saw that Man was alone, even yet. That was not good. It was the desire of God that all things should be good for Man.

God sensed the loneliness of Man. God knew that feeling of loneliness, coming up from deep within.

You see, God always wanted someone to love. God had a great desire to fulfill the great capacity for love God felt in the sacred heart. This love, the desire to do for another whatever would be best for them, should be fulfilled. It was the Master's plan. The great over-flowing source that welled up from within the heart of the one called God should be fulfilled. God should find a lover.

It was God's notion that one day there would be another. A being would come to life to whom God could relate the sacred name. That sacred name, given the Creator by the Creator, was the most important word of all Creation. It cried out the very essence of the Divine Being – `I-Will-Risk-My-Very-Being-On-Your-Behalf'. "I will do everything I can for you even though it may cost me everything!"

In Hebrew, we call this name "Yahweh". It is the word which speaks of this willingness to sacrifice for us. This Yahweh is the One you and I call `God'.

God thought and thought about the man, Adam. One night, Yahweh helped Adam sleep a very deep sleep. God gently took a rib from Adam's side. God carefully carried it down by the river bank.

Then God began to pack mud around the rib until God had created Woman, a person of beauty and strength and sensitivity, but different from Adam. From that day to this women have tried to improve on God's work of beauty by using more and more mud packs.

God created Eve to receive the same love that Adam received, and to share love both with God and with Adam. This was the first love triangle. It was very good.

Now Adam and Eve made their home in a beautiful garden. In the midst of that garden rose a bubbling spring. This spring never stopped flowing. It overflowed like the cup of God's love.
From the bubbling waters of that spring rose the headwaters of the four rivers of the earth. The rivers were teeming with fish and frogs and water-skippers and crawdads.

Between the banks of the rivers rose all the vegetation of the earth. There were pine trees and poplars, bamboo and tumbleweeds, bluegrass and roses.

As Adam and Eve stood on the bank of one of those rivers in the early morning, they could survey all that God had done in ordering Creation. The splendor of Yahweh's creation on their behalf filled their hearts with awe and reverence. Their voices would sound beyond the range of the garden as they sang together:

O Lord my god, when I in awesome wonder,
Consider all the worlds thy hands have made;
I see the stars, I hear the rolling thunder,
Thy power throughout the universe displayed.
Then sings my soul, my saviour God to Thee
How great Thou art. How great Thou art.
Then sings my soul, my saviour God to Thee
How great Thou art. How great Thou art.
(Boberg, Carl. Translated by Stuart A Hine. "How Great Thou Art" (Nashville: The Methodist Publishing House 1966)

But not all life held only a sense of majesty and awe. There was a sense of closeness, of warmth, of caring between God and Adam and Eve. And fun. They joked about the size God had made the giraffe's neck. They laughed at boxing kangaroos and they cuddled koala bears.

Occasionally a light-hearted mood would come over Adam and he would sing a little song that has become a theme song for politicians and television evangelists.

O Lord, it's hard to be humble
When you're perfect in every way.
I can't wait to look in a mirror.
I get better lookin' each day.
To know me is to love me....
(Oh, Lord, It’s Hard To Be Humble)

And just as God smiled often in the process of ordering Creation, now God smiled again. This was not a smile such as you might see on the evangelist who just saw a thousand-dollar bill in the collection plate. It was not the smile on the face of Grandma when Johnny breaks a centuries-old vase.

God smiled that deep loving and caring smile. God enjoyed the openness and humor and the loving nature of these Ones for whom God was prepared to lay the Sacred Existence on the line. Everything was shared, and open, lit by the radiance of their relationship.

In the evening the three of them would walk arm in arm around the garden, talking about every little event of the day. God relished every moment of this. It was a fulfillment of creative love between them as they walked and talked. This little doe deer was now apparently pregnant.

This rabbit had moved to a new home, a home not threatened by the fox or by the dog.

And when the evening was done, as the fireflies sparkled across their path, Adam and Eve would make their farewell with Yahweh – a hug and a "Good night!" – and settle into good, sound, restful sleep.

Now in the midst of the garden stood two trees. Yahweh had told Adam and Eve that they were not to eat the fruit that abounded on these trees. God had not really given them a reason for the prohibition. There was nothing but trust and openness between them. If God said they were not to eat the fruit of the trees, they didn't eat the fruit of the trees. That was all. Period.

But inside Eve something was gnawing, gnawing the way a tiny termite soon destroys and devours a mansion. A question, a wondering, a searching.....

One night, after the evening walk with God and while the fireflies still made their minute torches seen through the garden, Eve spoke. Quietly, almost with a touch of pain.

"Adam, I've been thinking. You know those two trees near the spring? The ones with the beautiful fruit that God has said we are supposed to avoid?"

Now Adam, lying there with Eve close beside, had nearly gone to sleep in the stillness, but now he was wide awake. Something in Eve's voice warned him of things to come. Something dreaded, something....

"Yes, Eve, I know them."

"Adam, I wonder how they would taste?"

"We'll probably never know, Eve."

"Adam, I wonder what might happen if we ate some of the fruit? I mean, really, what would happen?"

"Well, I really don't know. I cannot imagine that God would let anything hurt us, except when we stub our toe or something."

Again there was a long silence before Eve spoke again. Adam knew his thoughts were echoing hers. "Let's go have some of that fruit. What could it hurt, if God doesn't find out?"
"I suppose that's true. What could it hurt?"

By morning, as the light began to appear over the horizon, over the top of the very tree from which they had eaten, Adam and Eve had still not slept. Together they had lain in the darkness frozen by the awareness of their deeds. The fruit had been sweet, and warm, and had felt good in their stomachs.

But now with that satisfaction, Adam and Eve lay together, close, but could not touch in the night.

Their hearts were cold, and the sweat that poured from their brows was not from the heat. Oh, they were still alive. They now knew there was no great immediate death awaiting them. The tree was not poison. It brought no physical pain.

Their problem was not something the fruit of the tree had brought. They had brought it themselves. They had done something only with themselves. They had shared an event with each other. They knew some moments of time they could not share with their Creator....

This God, who had created them just in order to have someone to receive the love...

This God, who had begun to fulfill the Name that was to be the Divine Calling Card...

This God who loved them and relished every living moment with them...

This God, who risked the very existence of Creation on the potential relationship between Man, and Woman, and God....

They could no longer share every moment with God.

In the early light their eyes met and then turned away. For the first time they saw each other as they really were...unfaithful, untrusting, and...apart. They could not bear the thought of having the other see them in their separation. They turned away from each other.

Through the whole day they hid, afraid to be seen by the other. How they longed for the touch of the other, longed for the words from the other that would make everything all right. Both listening. Both afraid.

The Garden was quiet. No laughter. No raucous singing of being humble. Even the birds didn't sing. The pigs didn't grunt. The lions didn't even purr. Even the earthworms tried to quiet their gentle movements....

In the evening, God came to the center of the garden, knowing something was wrong.

"Adam. Eve."

"Adam! Eve!"

"Adam!! Eve!!"

The words rang and hissed through the garden, filling every clearing among the trees just as the thunder after a close lightning strike. When they heard the voice of God, Adam and Eve took some leaves from the fig tree and made clothes that hid themselves.

"Adam!! Eve!!"

Adam and Eve heard, and came, and looked down. They studied the ground in front of God.
Now perhaps what God did next was the second hardest thing God ever did. But there was no choice. Adam and Eve had chosen to be apart from God, to have events and thoughts and dreams in their lives that they could not and would not share with their Creator and Lover.

Because God was betting everything, risking it all on them, God gave them what they had chosen.

As they walked toward the gate, God did what could be done. God took flower petals from the vines and added them to the clothing they had made for each other.

"You will need all the beauty in your life you can get. No one need ever see your shame, or your apartness. If it is your choice, no one need ever see your alienation from each other or from me. Those who come after you, if they choose to be apart from me, it will not be because of your example. It will be because they choose it for themselves. But I will go with you, and be near to you, unless you tell me to leave."

And Adam and Eve walked out the gates of the garden. Their eyes were down, blurred and unseeing. As they walked, the whole garden of trees and plants and grass and animals and bugs and birds sang a prayer for them:

Someone's crying, Lord, come by here.
Someone's crying, Lord, come by here.
Someone's crying, Lord, come by here.
Oh, Lord, come by here. (Kum Ba Yah)

Lazarus

Lazarus
John 11:1
Karl Evans
1980-2007

Jesus had many friends. There were many people who, whether or not they believed he was the Messiah, just liked the guy. They just cared about him for the person he was.

Sometimes Jesus made his friends laugh with his jokes about Herod. Jesus called Herod ‘The Fox’. Sometimes Jesus teased the Pharisees, or even the disciples. Jesus had pet names for some of the disciples. He re-named Simon as Peter, The Rock. The disciples knew it was something of a joke. Soon everyone began to use the new name.

Among Jesus friends was Lazarus, brother of Mary and Martha. Sometimes Lazarus found Jesus just to tell him some bad jokes. Not dirty, and not degrading to anyone. Just awful jokes. Often Jesus laughed and told some of his own very bad jokes to Lazarus. Jesus wasn't too good at comedy unless he was poking fun at Pharisees or priests or governors. Even then he used comedy to make a point about the new world to come soon.

So Jesus enjoyed Lazarus. Their time together was warm and good. But, as happens to people, there came a time when Lazarus became ill suddenly and died a few days later. The family sent for Jesus when Lazarus became ill. Jesus did not immediately return to their home.

Lazarus finally died. Jesus had not come. It seemed to some that Jesus purposely stalled coming to Lazarus. Everyone around him had their own comments to make. Some were frustrated that Jesus did not come before Lazarus died. Some only spoke to themselves in quiet contemplation. Some spoke to God. Few tried to defend Jesus.

Few people look forward to death. Everyone seems to feel the need to say something about death when it comes close. When family or friend knows the nearness of death, talking seems to help.

Jared, a boyhood friend and neighbor, came early to see Mary and Martha, the sisters of Lazarus. In the sadness of their crying, Jared tried to give them comfort.

He hugged them both, and they talked about Lazarus. Jared said how Lazarus had been a good friend. He said it must just have been his time to die. It must have been the will of God. Yes, that's it. He died because God wanted him to die.

Now another friend, Sam-el, one who had been even closer to Lazarus, was just about destroyed by Lazarus' death. Lazarus had been working with Sam-el as a counselor, helping him understand and cope with his own problems.

Now with Lazarus gone, he had no friend, no counselor, no one to turn to. The lonely Sam-el could only sit and sob. Lazarus' death might as well have been his own. The death of one was a total loss for the other.

Now in those days the nation was actually in the hands of the Roman army. Roman troops could find shelter wherever they chose in nearly every city and town in Palestine.

As the sound of the wailing of Mary and Martha came from the house, a small squad of Roman soldiers walked by in the street. By the sound and the black-draped doorpost, they knew there was a death.

These were men who faced death every day. Their end might come from a street battle, or from training. They might feel the sword in a pitched battle as the Romans tried to take over another nation. But, as with most armies, no one talked to them about their own death.

They talked as they walked by. "I don't think anyone will make that much fuss about me when I die. No one cares that much."

Another suggested a course of action. "What you should do is to marry some really homely girl. Then when you die, she will be in such a sad state! She'll bawl like a sick calf because no one else will ever want her."

A third soldier joined in. "Naaawww. He’s too ugly himself. There isn't any girl who is desperate enough to want him! When he was born the midwife slapped his mother."

"I don't see why these Jews make so much fuss over anyone. Death really doesn't mean anything."

"I've killed a hundred or two, and they were all the same. One of these days someone else will kill me. The world will keep on keeping on."

"So what if another dies, especially just another Jew. There’s just something I don’t trust about these people."

"You know, Jews are so lazy that when one of them dies its usually three days before anyone notices."

"I think this family is one of those that followed Jesus, the Galilean. You know, he talks a lot about getting to heaven. Maybe this fellow had his own way and got to leave early."

The young soldiers moved on down the street as a group. Laughing. Talking. Teasing. Bragging. Just moving and wondering.

But inside the house, things weren't that calm. Mary and Martha were living through the stages in their mourning. They saw Jesus was to blame for the whole thing. They had sent for him. He just did not care enough to come. Then Lazarus died. Without Jesus.

Mary and Martha and Jared and Sam-el could only be caught up in the death of Lazarus. They sat quietly through most of the hours before burial. The ritual preparation of the body for burial took only a little time. Then Lazarus was buried in the family tomb. It was done.

When Jesus came to the door, he was not met by warmth for a friend. Martha and the others met him with resentment and self-pity. The cold emotional overtones of personal blame were startling to Jesus.

Mary was the outspoken one. "Jesus, I really thought you cared. All these months you have been telling us how you loved us. You have been saying we should love each other. And we believed you.

“You even told us what we should do if we love each other. You said we should do as you do. We have seen you make the blind see. We have seen you make the deaf hear and the epileptic straight.

“But what about us? We have walked all over Galilee with you. Why do you spend all your time with those who don't even walk with you? Why do you care only about a bunch of sinners who just don't care about you?

“Yet you let Lazarus, a man you say you love, just lay down and die. You don't even bother coming around until after he is dead long enough to start smelling bad. Is it asking too much for you to be here when someone is sick? When someone who loves you is about to die?"

Now it was Martha who spoke. The fire and discouragement in her voice betrayed her sorrow. And her anger at God.

"Jesus, I really do not think you care. Maybe you have a big head now from having all these people hanging around you. I don't think you feel a thing. The whole town talks about you like some kind of god. Even I used to think you were some kind of god. Maybe I even the Messiah.

“But right now I don't want a god. I want someone who cares. I need someone who feels. I need someone who has blood in their veins, not ice water.

“You may be a god. Fine. Right now we need a man. You never hurt. You never have any pain. You could have saved my brother, who practically worshiped you. When we needed you, you were too obsessed with saving millions."

Jesus would have reached out to hold them. They drew back in anger and hurt. Cold pain flew at Jesus from their eyes. They would not let Jesus hold them, or touch them.

Jesus' eyes filled with tears at their words and at the anger in their voices and in their eyes. He looked at the floor for a moment, then asked quietly, "Where is he buried?"

Martha snapped "Why go there now? He's been dead three days. He'll be smelling to high heaven now. The time to see him was three days ago, when you might have done something. You could have been here at least to just to hold his hand while he died."

But Jesus went to the sandstone cave. Some friends of the family had rolled a flat piece of stone over the mouth of the grave. They sealed the small holes around the edge of the opening with a sand and limestone mud. This kept out burrowing animals and moisture. Jesus broke through the sealer and rolled away the flat stone.

Jesus knelt on both knees in front of the cave, deep in prayer. As he knelt silently, big tears rolled down his cheeks. In the silence the drops seemed to make big splashes as they fell to the ground. It seemed to some who stood by as if Jesus struggled for words.

Martha whispered bitterly to her sobbing sister. "Thinking about himself, again. Right now he is probably thinking about what he will look like when he dies. He is wondering how many thousands will come to his own funeral."

The crowd began to grow. Within a few minutes, eight or ten gathered around. Watching and waiting with no real expectation of anything. Some stood silently with curiosity and confusion written on their faces. Some eyes showed bitterness toward the seeming lack of concern of Jesus. He should have cared more for the illness and death of an old friend and supporter.

Some jeered. Some made off-color remarks about loyalty, and about hypocrisy, and about what Jesus was going to do with the body. Some questioned Jesus' sanity. Why would a man with a healthy mind open a sealed tomb?

Jesus only said, quietly, "Lazarus, my friend, come out to me." Then Jesus knelt, obviously in earnest prayer. The only sound was from the gossip of the crowd.

Now, Lazarus began to stir. The cloths around him began to move. The crowd suddenly stopped its murmuring. In the darkness of the tomb the crowd could clearly see the burial cloths part.

First a hand appeared, then another. The hands silently pulled the rags away from Lazarus’ head. Lazarus crouched low, now. His feet and legs were still wrapped as he began to move toward the mouth of the low tomb.

The others moved back quickly. There was suddenly no need to become involved in the events of the day. They let Jesus kneel alone in silence in front of the tomb.

Lazarus pulled himself out of his own grave and stood in the door of the grotto. Jesus put his arm around Lazarus. Jesus barely mussed the white cloths with which Mary and Martha had wrapped Lazarus.

Lazarus and Jesus and Mary and Martha and Jared and Sam-el walked away. There would be another day to die. Not today.

As For Me and My Family . . .

As for Me and My Family
Karl Evans

Zechariah considered himself lucky. He was a priest of Israel. That was enough, but he was more. A holy man, a son in a family of priests. In the very personal way of his ancestors, Zechariah chose to live his life as a very public priest.

Everyone around watched as he put his faith and his beliefs into every motion and word. His friends and neighbors honored his calling. Any priest could and often did fail as a man. The honor was for his calling. The calling came from the Lord.

Zechariah spent his hours and his will helping others. He gathered around himself any who were willing to struggle seriously with life. Their own relationships with family and neighbors, with the temple and with the Lord were their focus.

Together they worked out details of their own faith in action. These faithful Jews tried to be carefully proper in religious practice. As do any who are called to help order this part of life, Zechariah worked hard to develop patterns and habits of faith in action.

The sacrifices and other rituals were in Zechariah’s keeping. Helping his family and his neighbors work out their relationships with the Creator was his life. It was the holiest of callings. The prayers, songs and readings from the scrolls of the faith were his tools. These pieces of literature made relationships with the Lord real in the hearts of the people.

The nation of Zechariah was the holiest of nations. His language was the holiest of languages. The sacred hope of Zechariah was to use himself and his tools completely. His task was to build the Kingdom of the Lord with those tools. He lived to lead the community to deeper relationship with the Lord of the Universe.

Zechariah and Elizabeth were very aware this. They were most comfortable with his sacred portion. He had within his soul the sense and the responsibility of sacred events. The timing and shaping of the most ordinary, important and beautiful human activities were in his care.

Many priests do not have this inner excitement of the soul. It arises from close contact with the Divine One. Some of the priests who seemed most public around the temple were especially tepid with their sacrificial touch. Priestly wannabes often passed ritual sensitivity off as some sort of softness or even lunacy. Spiritual sensitivity taking hold of one’s life is a universally beautiful event.

Sometimes Zechariah felt wonderful ecstasy when the High Priest entered the Holy of Holies. The only action – ever – in that room was the High Priest speaking the name of the Lord. This majestic act came only once each year. On the Day of Atonement. Knowing that was happening at that precise moment always gave Zechariah a bodily chill.

Sometimes Zechariah thrilled to the sacred chants of the temple priests. It was a high sacred moment when one of them approached the altar. The temple priest usually walked accompanied by two visiting priests. These men came from other parts of the world on pilgrimage to Jerusalem. In the holy city each tried to serve at the temple as an act of faith. Serving two times each year at the temple was the standard.

Together they approached the altar slowly and solemnly. Together they offered prayers as they lit little bits of incense. The incense burned slowly and quietly. As it glowed, the scent lifted the whole environment while Zechariah's heart pounded within him.

Sacred events were Zechariah's full calling in life. More than anything else in life he wanted more than to lift his life to the Lord. It was his way to serve through the rituals of the temple, synagogue and home.

His heart quickened at all such times. Zechariah always preferred to be in Jerusalem. Whether he lived his days out in Jerusalem or not, his soul was there. Sometimes he watched the rituals in person if he happened to be in Jerusalem at the Temple on his semiannual duty.

If Zechariah stayed home in Galilee, he was still a priest. He earned his living trading leather goods at the market. But even in the market place, he lived the temple rhythms. His heart knew the sacrifice and prayer times at the temple.

At these hours his mind's eye filled with the vision of the priests. Zechariah could see them going about their duties a hundred and fifty miles away.

He even warmed to the ancient readings from Ezekiel and Isaiah at the appointed time. These sacred words told of the work of the priests in Babylonian exile six hundred years earlier.

Even the work of the priests of the Babylonian religion was exciting to contemplate. The Babylonians had held the Hebrews captive two hundred years. They had their own gods.
Babylonian life centered around the Ziggurat and the great temples of the enslaving people. But these men and women remained faithful to their gods and to their calling. The Jews knew these priests must be honored and respected as faithful in their way. The calling to be a priest is high in every religion of earth. There is a unity of the priesthood, even across faith lines.

Zechariah's calling as a priest of the One God surpassed any nationalist patriotism. The thought of any faithful priestly action moved his soul to new life.

On one of his duty weeks in Jerusalem Zechariah held the privilege of attending to the temple priest of the day. The temple priest skillfully organized the evening prayer and incense offering. The priest asked Zechariah to lead the procession to the altar. This was both an honor and a personally dramatic moment.

Zechariah walked stately along the aisle. The path carried him between the rows of a couple hundred Jerusalem residents and visitors who had gathered for the daily ritual. The Galilean priest carried the incense box at arms’ length in front of him. Zechariah walked intently and steadily toward the alter. As he walked, he chanted the old call to worship. These stately words echo even today through the assemblies of God's people.

"Prepare the way of the Lord!"
"Prepare the way of the Lord!"

Now the three priests stood in deep reverence at the altar. This is yet the holiest place of the holiest people. The holiest words spoken carefully by the priest expressed the holiest thoughts of humankind.

Zechariah was to light the incense at the great altar. But the faithful man, lost in spiritual sensitivity before the altar, seemed unable to move. It was as though he were frozen in time and space.

The temple priest was prepared for this. The guild of priests knew the embarrassing possibility. They knew one day some priest from a far land might get stage fright and be unable to serve. When the priest sensed a frozen moment, he covered the clumsiness. Easily he stepped around the frozen priest. The priest took the match from the hand of Zechariah and touched the incense with it.

The patient priest could not know the fullness of the vision of the faithful Zechariah. Zechariah stood, eyes wide-open but unseeing. A brilliant vision came before him at the altar. This vision shaped his entire life in a quick ritual moment. Somehow he knew in this time that Elizabeth would bear a son. The son would be one for whom they had prayed in earnest hope. They knew God would answer.

Zechariah also knew his son’s name would be John. This would be a surprise, for John was not a name from his own family. His inability to speak now told him he would be mute from that day until the day John was born!

Zechariah was immediately lifted high by the vision. For nine months it didn't matter he couldn't speak. Elizabeth would have a son. That would have brought pleasure and excitement enough to the elderly couple. The greater thrill was that this son would be a holy priest, perhaps even the high priest!

Both Zechariah and Elizabeth were of the Levitic priestly line. That meant their son would have an opportunity to become the high priest of the nation. True, it was somewhat a political office. It was certainly the highest office in the world in the minds of these faithful lovers.

The most difficult condition for a high priest of the nation was met in the marriage of Zechariah and Elizabeth. The high priest had to be the son of a man and woman who were both of priestly families. This possibility alone would validate every part of their lives together. It would give sacred wings to their love!

The second condition for the high priest had to do with commitment. Many men who might be candidates were simply not willing to serve. The high priesthood had sunk to a low level now. The reign of Herod and the occupation by Rome had been hard on the priesthood.

Herod the Great, the alien king, had installed his own high priest. Rome recognized this man as the legitimate voice of the temple. They only wanted to pacify Herod. Recognition by the people as the only meaningful high priest meant extreme danger. It probably would bring certain death. Herod would tolerate no opposition. A high priest and his family must face this as a matter of ordinary life.

On the other hand, Herod could name any man as high priest. Then the priests and lay people of the Jews could and would reject him as legitimate. This would replace the spiritual realities of the temple with politics and rebellion. Zechariah and Elizabeth knew all this. Their faith moved them to go beyond the danger and support their son toward his calling.

The son was born, Zechariah called him "John."

"John?" Elizabeth and many friends of the family were puzzled. "Why have you chosen that name for your son? There is no one else in the family by that name. Have you lost your sense of reason? Is your tongue not working properly?"

Zechariah could only smile and answer "The Lord has told me his name should be `John'. That is all I know." From that day forward, Zechariah could speak again.

For the next twelve years, Zechariah and Elizabeth and the local rabbi, Simeon, schooled him well. Simeon taught John to read the scriptures of the ancient days. Elizabeth told him all they knew about the covenant between God and the people Israel. Zechariah talked through with him the matter of righteousness and holiness.

Zechariah and Elizabeth realized their special calling. Each day they spent hour after hour pouring through all the prophetic teachings about the Messiah.

What is most important, they knew the Messiah was yet to come. They talked as a family about what the Messiah would mean to Israel. They shared visions of the world after he did make his appearance.

The family talked about the Messiah also being a priest. They planned what the family and Israel must do to prepare for the coming of the Messiah. This conversation placed an additional strain on their lives, but it was a good strain. It helped them deal with the stress of living under the Herods and the Romans.

Israel as a nation must constantly prepare itself for the coming of the Messiah. Their son might be the one who would lead Israel in its preparation for redemption. If so, surely Zechariah and Elizabeth would have great responsibility. On their shoulders would rest preparation of their son for his life's work.

They raised their son to be at peace with God. Elizabeth said they should prepare the way of the Lord. They could do this by building into their family an ability to love. Their commitment must be to righteousness. Their call was to serve the Lord without reservation.

In the evenings the family talked of their faith. Young John began to form in his heart deeper feelings about preparation for the Messiah. The maturing youth began to see the radical nature of his call to be the voice of the Lord. He was called to serve without concern for the danger to his own life.

As the years passed, Zechariah often took John along on his duty weeks in Jerusalem. As his father before him, the boy sensed his calling. Young John always found himself caught up in one spectacular moment in the daily life of the temple. At this high sacred point the priest walked down the aisle of the Temple chanting:

"Prepare the way of the Lord!"
"Prepare the way of the Lord!"

John sometimes stood hidden deep in the crowd. At other times he was near enough to touch his father's hand. Often he could close his eyes, sensing nothing but the grace of the ritual. Now, instead of the priest singing, it was the sound of a majestic angel crying out:

"Prepare the way of the Lord!"
"Prepare the way of the Lord!"

Always the lessons of the faith ran through his heart in these words. These spoken moments of living faith were precious. They were stronger to him than all the reading from the scriptures. Reading and lifting the covenant required hours of concentration. Deep questions from the synagogue class stretched his mind. John took all this very seriously.

Then came the day they ordained John a priest. He was now a special man. Legally and in the eyes of the religion, he was set apart. He was not just an adult male. That ceremony had come three years earlier at his twelfth birthday. Today he is ordained as a priest in the nation Israel.

For John, fasting for the required thirty days before the ceremony was not bad. He had fasted earlier in his life. The strong young man was all right with the rigors of going without food. John rather enjoyed spending his fasting time in prayer and in meditation. The new priest was obsessed now with the events of this day. He knew his own responsibilities as a priest.

John had always looked ahead to the next few years. He would spend his time learning the rituals and practices of temple service. Then he would be ready to take his turn at the high place.

But in these early days of fasting and preparation, John had become aware of a very different plan for his life. This plan did not seem to come from within himself. He felt it came from his relationship with the Lord. It showed itself as a self awareness vision. The plan would take him in directions away from temple service and ceremonial purity.

John walked slowly to the cool tiled pool in the Essene community. His heart was comfortable here where his ordination was to take place. His warm eyes met his father’s. Zechariah was now a very old man, but his faith was warm.

John's ears – but not his heart – were hearing the tender prayer-psalms of the Essenes, the pious and faithful ones. These were prayers for purity and faithfulness and simplicity. They focused his mind and heart again on the old, old words of the temple chants.

Even in Zechariah’s late years his voice was strong and disciplined and clear. John stepped slowly into the cool waters of the pool. As he did, he heard his father's voice as if again ringing from the steps of the Temple.

"Prepare the way of the Lord!"
"Prepare the way of the Lord!"

Now the waters of the Pool of the Purification were feeling cool on his feet. Carefully the personal helpers among the priests and laity moved to him. They began to ritually strip him of his robes and his loin cloth. Pausing only for a simple prayer, John was aware at once of the Temple call to prepare the way of the Lord. With that in his heart, he plunged naked into the cool waters of the Pool of Purification.

The determined young John, a Man of the Lord, knelt on the bottom of the pool. A priest ran his hand over John's back and head to be certain the clear waters of the Pool of Purification covered it completely.

The waters came over his body and released him from the forces of gravity and from his own past. John felt himself lifted now. He was not aware whether he was buoyed by something ordinary or other worldly. It might be the physical buoyancy of his body in the waters, by the Spirit of the Lord, or by his own commitment. John knew full well his was a special role in the world. It was a role no one else could fill. Somehow the Lord would use the waters of this Pool of Purification. With them the Lord would release both John and the nation from the sins of the past.

Somehow within John there was a way of knowing sacred things. John knew he would not die until he had seen the Messiah, the Chosen One of the Lord. John would live to greet the One who would redeem the world.

John would see - perhaps even be a catalyst for - the making of the new relationship between the Lord and the People. Then this new way of living would last until the end of time.
John knew it was God's grace which redeems. He also knew it is a person’s responsibility to live the pure life after the redemption. More, it had been the grace of the Lord which had chosen John. He eagerly answered his own call. John was read for his own role. He could and would announce the coming of the Messiah to the world.

His Spirit now felt calmed by the waters of purification. John rose to come out. Here was the new man, baptized by water and purified by grace. He dried himself carefully in the sun. The boy-man who would be priest then wrapped the towel around himself. His mother had prepared a soft white cloth especially for this sacred event.

One of John's mentors among the priests of the Essenes led him to the cupboard where the scrolls of scripture were kept. These scrolls of the laws of Moses and of the Prophets were open to his choice.

John was surprised to feel his hand taken by his father. Zechariah gently squeezed it. Then with great determination he placed it gently on the scroll of the prophet Isaiah. He firmly but gently pressed the young hand against the document of hope and expectation. The Teacher of Righteousness served as leader of the Essene community. Now he repeated the words said over all priests at their ordination, even to this day.

"Take the authority to teach and to declare that which you find in the Scriptures. May the Lord defend you with righteous strength and heavenly grace."

Again the voices of the community around John rang with the old words. They were the sacred call heard in the temple and in the temple of John's heart.

"Prepare the way of the Lord."
"Prepare the way of the Lord."

Zechariah and Elizabeth spread John's robe around his shoulders. The parents held him in a family embrace for a moment. They kissed and shared huge tears.

As the three held each other, Elizabeth's mind wandered to the first days of her son's life. Those first painful days were filled with humbling awe at the new life. The mother both reveled in and dreaded the prospect of future threats and hurts. Even when she held him as an infant, there was a special quality about him.

John went to greet each spiritual brother or sister in the little Essene community. The young priest hugged each individually. As their faces touched, John heard only words of personal and community support.

As each held John for a moment, one could hear a little prayer and personal request for the new priest.

"Prepare the way of the Lord!"
"Prepare the way of the Lord!"

Then John returned for one last quietly ecstatic embrace with his parents. Now committed and ordained, the new priest stood for a moment alone. Then the would-be high priest of the nation Israel walked slowly off into the desert.

A Good War -- A Good Death

A Good War

Luke 8:22-25

Copyright: Karl Evans

"It’s not right, really. It just doesn’t work out. The prophets made their promises hundreds of years ago. The priests keep making promises today. They promise and promise. Nothing comes of them. It just isn’t right."

The other fishermen on the boat were used to this. They knew Delos well enough. They just let him go on. And on.

Rough weather was not uncommon on Lake Tiberias, as the Romans called it. The Jews called it the Sea of Galilee. But the name did not matter.

This lake was the livelihood, even the life, of the few thousands who lived on he shores. It controlled their lives in many ways. The economy was about fishing. The fresh water even supplied small gardens for the families. But it was not an easy life.

When the winds and rain came hard, they put a lot more pressure on people such as Delos. Sometimes it seemed to be more than he could handle. Delos seemed to flip out from the wind and rain and all the stress of his life. The others just let him talk. They could do nothing else.

"I have done nothing to deserve this. Oh, I have made my mistakes, sure enough. Nothing I have ever done should cause this." The sound of a bitter man mumbling to himself is always a scab on this world.

Delos made those around him very uneasy. They knew he was no direct danger to his neighbors and partners. Their problem was that they did not know how to help him, except by letting him talk to himself in their presence. Perhaps he could work past his grief and his struggle. They did not know what else to do.

They were also afraid of his bitter words. If those words should find their way to the Romans, they would invite trouble. These invaders would assume some manner of group revolt from the fishermen. They would crush the assumed revolt without question or remorse.

Delos’ faithfulness to his beloved Samantha, his son, the temple and even to the Romans themselves would count for nothing. A revolt must be crushed. Any revolt. Crushed, and crushed hard.

Delos raised his son alone. His beautiful wife died young, many years ago. These were hard years for Delos and his son, but they still went by too quickly. Too soon came the time for Delimon to look to the horizon for new life. Too soon came the time for Delos to begin to relax his hold on the next generation of the family. Too soon came the time for Delos to be alone in the world. He could only remember the good years with Samantha and Delimon.

Delimon quickly grew into a strong, mannerly, polite young man. Delos sometimes smiled privately at his handsome son. Delos could see the attraction between the son and the young women of the town. Delos enjoyed watching his son become the target of romantic notions.

Every girl around the lake, it seemed, watched him as he grew to manhood. His laughter and his obvious concern for those around him brought the attention he craved after the death of his mother.

Delos enjoyed having Delimon around, really. Supporting him was a lot of extra work at first. Caring for the household needs and guiding Delimon added hours to his day. He did not feel burdened for long, though.

He could see Samantha’s smile in Delimon’s eyes and face lines. His skin reminded Delos of her touch. His laughter was like hers, gentle and easy. Neighbors and strangers chose to be around Delimon. Delimon made good company for a lonely Delos who mourned the death of his wife through the rest of his life.

The pride of Delos' life grew to near-manhood. At fourteen, Delimon spent most of his time working and studying and growing. Young men and women have taken this pattern of personal development since time began.

The worldly Syrian capital of Damascus is a great arena for learning skill and grace. Living in Damascus was great training for one who had designs on a higher position in the world. Delimon learned to see himself as a ranking officer of the Roman Government. He saw himself as a leader of men, maybe in the military.

Delimon also thought he might build a business, an international import-export system. He saw the potential for profit in the trading he witnessed along the great caravan routes. He listened and watched the people around him. He learned about other peoples on the far sides of the earth. Soldiers and traders and diplomats of Spain and Egypt and India covered Damascus. These travelers were as much parts of his life as were the Greek alphabet and the Roman Legions.

Even with this in his mind, though, Delimon stayed close to his father. From Damascus, Delimon began to travel around the region. He could always be home in a few days. Sometimes he could catch a ride on a passing chariot, or help with a caravan in return for a horseback or camelback ride. Sometimes they could only send letters to each other.
As the young man grew, Delos could only offer some small advice to his son. "Pay attention to the caravans. Watch what sells and what doesn’t."

Sometimes Delos could only sit and listen to the new generation. Delimon spoke with ease and wonder at all he had seen. The market place and the government halls teemed with life every day.

Finally it was time for Delimon to serve his six years in the Roman Legion. The army of Syria enforced Roman law over the area, from the land of ancient Babylon to Egypt and Asia Minor. Delos did not own a slave to send in place of Delimon. He had no money to pay someone else to go. Delimon had to walk his own path now.

He wrote home a few times over the first two or three years. These were just short notes to his father. Letters were hard to send from campaigns in far countries of the Empire. The final message did not come from Delimon, but from another soldier. This note has meant bitterness and sorrow for families and nations around the world.

"Yehula, the supreme commander of the armies of the sovereign nation of Syria, regrets to inform you of the death of Delimon bar Delos. You may be proud of him. He died fighting for the most noble cause of all. He died to save the empire from its enemies.

Hail mighty Caesar!"

That was the end of Delimon bar Delos, son of Delos of Damascus. Twenty years of hope. Twenty years of joy and sorrow. Twenty years of seeing in the son the life of the mother.

It was not the end of his memory. It was not the end of the hurt, or the pride, or the love. It did not end the bitterness of Delos.

Somehow Delos knew he would keep his bitterness forever. He would be bitter toward the Romans and toward God and toward life itself until the day he died. He began to drift away from making leather goods, shoes and harnesses and belts. Finally Delos gathered his knives, awls and punches into a simple knapsack. He carefully wrapped and packed into the knapsack the remaining articles from the life of his beloved wife. Then, with a last quick glance around, closed the door of his tiny home. Delos never went back.

Delos drifted south, stopping long enough in several villages to earn enough for a few meals. Finally he made it to the shores of the Sea of Galilee. The Romans had renamed it Lake Tiberias. Delos began to work around the area, selling his handiwork. The lonely widower never left.

Eventually Delos began to work on another man’s fishing boat. A hired hand had a better chance to make a day’s pay. He could keep up his leather work at night when he had was nothing else to do but mourn his wife and son. The other men went home to their families, but for Delos there was only the leather.

Day after day, Delos worked hard in the boat. Spreading the nets and hauling them in repeatedly all through the day was tough. The struggle and the sweating and the tired muscles were a gift. They kept Delos from losing himself in self-pity. He rebelled in his heart against mourning the loss of both his wife and their only child.

Then at night Delos whiled away time repairing the nets and re-pitching the boats. The others laughed and joked or spent time with their own families. Delos was driven by life itself. He worked as hard as possible to banish away the thoughts of rebellion and death and divine betrayal.

Delos spread the hot pitch on the seams of the boat using a crude hand-carved paddle. He wondered quietly where and how Delimon had died. He was bitter at the military establishments of Rome and Syria. These military geniuses had taken his only son to a violent death.

Delos thought of the good times the two of them had shared. They were few but powerful. Delos could only weep as the flood of memories came over him. The images of fishing together and running together filled his senses. They almost brought the boy to life again in the heart of the father.

The father also remembered the bad times. He was mad at himself for wasting even a moment of the days shared with Delimon. Father and son had known disagreements, even yelling matches. Thankfully, though, Delos and Delimon were close when Delimon left to serve in the legion.

Delos thought about the young excitement in Delimon. He had seen the wonder in his son's eyes at the rising sun. Delimon liked people. He had a gentle way with older friends and relatives. Almost everyone liked Delimon, especially the young women.

Delos appreciated the pretty girls who came around looking for his son. Now that Delimon was gone, still two or three regularly stopped to see if he had written. Now with Delimon was slain in battle, only one still checked on the old man of thirty-five.

Perhaps most important, Delimon had known great hopes for marriage and children of his own. Grandchildren might be around for Delos to adore in his own old age. Any of these who stopped would be quite acceptable as daughters-in-law. Not quite yet.

Now Delos was angry with God. God took the life of the son. If Delos could ever get this God in a corner, he would tell God a thing or two. Delos knew now God didn't care. War still went on. Young men still died. Delimon was not coming back, not even in a box. The survivors just bury the slain where they fall, these young men who die in battle. Often the soldiers have no time for even a simple ceremony.

Delos wrapped himself now in so much bitterness he was not aware of the world around himself. He did not see that some of his partners were on a mission. They were spending their evenings and the stormy days with a traveling teacher and prophet. They claimed to have even seen him perform miracles.

Delos tuned out their conversations in the boats when they talked about this man. Delos did not hear when they talked about the teacher. His own pain was deafening when they asked each other if Jesus were the Messiah. Delos kept to himself more every day. He even became a recluse to his own friends.

One clear spring day, fishing had been good. The men in the small fleet of boats saw a crowd gathered on the shore. This was unusual because the site was some distance from any town. Anyone standing out here must expect something big to happen. This looked like an eager crowd.

Delos could see the people seemed to gather around someone who must be a teacher or an entertainer. That was fine. In fact, it was very good.
Perhaps a chance to sell some fish to the crowd would come. They were probably hungry. People always want to eat. They might as well have been at a carnival or at a fair. What could be more satisfying than fresh fish, slowly roasted over an open fire?

The man was talking to the crowd as the boats neared the shore. While he talked, the men from the boats quickly sold cleaned and salted fish to the crowd. Soon small driftwood fires were blazing at several places along the shore. Some sharp entrepreneurs in the crowd saw an opportunity as the crowd began to cook and eat the fish.

Waiting at the boat, Delos was curious about the teacher. One of the crowd came to buy some fish and asked Delos’ opinion. "Do you know who this man is? Some say he is the son of God. What do you think?"

Delos looked again and laughed. "What? That loafer? The one they call the son of God? You make me laugh! I've seen him out on the boat. He can't even row a straight line. He doesn't look like anything special to me. If he's a Son of God, I would not want one of them to marry my sister."

About then, Jesus asked them to take him across the lake. He knew a few of the men. While the crowd finished their meal, Jesus and the small group of men climbed into their fishing boat. Once away from shore, Jesus, obviously tired, quickly went to sleep. While he slept, the others worked the sails and nets. They could fish their way across the arm of the Sea of Galilee.

Out on the lake, just as all the nets were out and filling with fish, a squall blew up. A squall on the Sea of Galilee can be a vicious blow. Air currents often rise off the hot land around the lake. Then they combine with cool air coming off the lake or coming inland from the Mediterranean. Together these can raise the wind to gale force in a matter of seconds. Such a blast can also reduce to calm air just as quickly.

Winds swirl and scream in every direction. Rain and hail rips at the sails and clothing. Lighting can wipe out entire boat loads of men. When the gale struck, the little boats were in serious danger. The builders did not rig them for so many people and so many fish and so much wind.

The men shouted and cursed as they frantically hauled in the nets. They stumbled around, crudely grabbing the blowing sails in their arms. The wave-tossed men struggled with the oars and tillers to keep from capsizing. They fought back panic as they struggled to reach the shore without attracting a bolt of lightning. The din of the wind and the men and the clattering boats and wooden equipment overcame any voices.

The open boats were in danger of swamping. Every wave dumped more water into the craft. The wind threatened to rip apart the sails and masts before the men could get them down. Heavy gusts whipped the boat around as if it were a piece of bark. Lives were going to be lost if the wind kept up. Some began to panic, fearing for their own lives.

The teacher, asleep in the front of the boat, never stirred. Finally, seeing the man asleep, Delos shook the man roughly. "Wake up! Wake up! Don't you care if you drown, you fool?"

The man wearily sat up and opened his bloodshot eyes. His dreams had taken him far away. Water cascading over the bow of the tiny boat brought him to reality. The spray from the rain and the waves was drenching him through. He looked around at the towering seas. He felt the water in the bottom of the boat and heard the mast beginning to break.

The man lifted his eyes to the heavens as if searching for some clue, some guidance. Then he spoke quietly, yet it seemed to Delos as if the voice echoed off the hills miles away. His words masked even the thunder of the storm and the cries of the men.

"Silence!"

It seemed the whole world stopped. The waves eased off to a gentle roll. A great gust dropped to an easy breeze.

The men on the boats stopped their struggling and stood in amazement. The shock and surprise of what had just happened quickly sat in.

For an incredulous moment, Delos forgot his anger over the death of his son. "Gosh, that guy back on the shore said you were the son of God. I didn't believe him. Anyone who can make the wind and the waves stop in their tracks must have some divine power of some kind."

Again, stunned silence as the other men wondered what to say or do. Nothing in their experience had prepared them for this. No one anticipated seeing the very storms obey the quiet voice of one strong man.

Delos, though, composed himself. He had still more to say. "Do you know what I think about you? Even if you are really the son of God? You are not really worth one little bitty fish scale. Not worth a thing."

"You sit up in the front of the boat. You sleep away while the rest of us work. We fish and break our backs on these fool boats just to survive and keep going. You talk and talk and do nothing. You act as if we should treat you like a king. So you can make the sea go calm. Big deal!" Delos began to find his fire. It was as if he finally had God in a corner.

"So who besides ourselves cares whether we drown or not? No one, that's who. You and your supposed father are too busy playing dominoes with the clouds and the seas. Go ahead and chase the clouds away. It doesn't matter to me or anyone else, anyway. Nothing you do matters."

"If you want to do something constructive, why don't you do something about war and about death? Do something about our kids killing each other."

Now Delos was feeling a strength from this man. Something about this man gave the frustrated Delos power to dump it all out now. He quickly seized the precious time of strong words to purge his soul.

"My wife died giving birth to my son. So I raised Delimon in the best way I could. It wasn't easy, but I loved her so much and I loved him. I did everything I could for him. I am proud of the way he turned out. But now he is dead. My son has died fighting some stupid war for some unknown purpose in some far-off god-forsaken land. Nothing about it even matters. It does not matter to me, or to you, or to anyone else."

"So why don't you at least stop people from killing each other. If you are the son of God, it seems you could do at least that."

Now the bitterness of Delos' heart was coming out. It was falling all over everyone in the boat as if it were a cataract on the Nile River. The spray of tears from the broken heart covered every man on the boat.

"Oh, but pardon me, I forgot. If you are the messiah, you don't know anything about death. You will never die."

"Well, maybe God won't do anything, but I have to. I cannot stand by and see other young men die in useless battle. These battles are just action by greedy human beings."

"Maybe it isn't God's affair, but it is my affair. I have to do something. Maybe you are right. God doesn't start wars, people start wars. I wish God cared! That's all I ask. I wish God cared about me and my son."

"God should care enough to live with what we humans have to live with. Maybe he would, if God had to die the way we have to die. Maybe God ought to have to die with a spear in his side. Maybe God should feel the whip on his back before he dies. Maybe God ought to know the feel of the spittle of enemies before death comes. I should feel better about God. I probably would if I thought God could ever know these things."

Jesus thought ahead. He tried to see into the future. The son of Mary wondered how he would die. He wondered about a spear in his side. He wondered about the whip.

The little boat was now nearing shore. Even yet no other man on the boat had spoken. No one knew words to say, either to Delos or to Jesus. As the boat slid upon the beach sand, Jesus turned to Delos.

"Delos, it may be you are the one who is pure. Will we know you as a true son of God? What does the father require of us? The Lord only wants us to present ourselves before him in purity and in faith?"

A year later a governor, a priest and the temple crowd sent Jesus to death. They called him a revolutionary. They branded him a rebel. The priests named him a heretic. Guards beat him until he could no longer carry his own cross. Soldiers nailed him to that cross and derisively crowned him ‘King of the Jews.’

Then Jesus died. His power was gone. They thought.

Meanwhile, Delos Yeshua lived on.

Love Talk

Love Talk

Luke 24:13-35

Karl Evans

So it was, on that day the world changed completely, forever. God had risked everything, and won.

Later that day, that first day of the Resurrection of Jesus, life went on. Bartholomew and Kelita walked together through the dusty streets of Jerusalem. The word was spreading fast among the community of faithful. Jesus was no longer in the grave. Jesus was alive.

The faithful community could not bear to be together just yet. Later they would gather to talk about what was going to happen. They would try to fathom what this resurrection meant, if it were really true. Perhaps more, they would just be together as people who knew God loved them. They needed to be together.

As Bartholomew and Kelita walked and talked, they calmed themselves. The close couple was able for the first time to really share what was on their minds. In their faith and their conversation they destroyed for themselves all the old expectations and boxes with which people yet today live with in the resurrection of Jesus. Now Bartholomew and Kelita suddenly felt they didn't need to worry about what other people thought about their relationship. The pair was free to worry only about their relationships with Jesus, and with each other. They held hands walking together on the streets of Jerusalem. This was a strange thing in those days.

Bartholomew and Kelita talked about children and they talked about love. They had the sense of release with forgiveness and grace. Just as water floods over a spillway when the gates are opened, new conversations came, spilled out and found their own channels. New questions arouse about where they wanted to live. They debated their choices of new careers. They talked openly with each other about their sex life and about their feelings when they touched each other.

As they walked along, they thought about the gathering that evening. Nothing was certain in these first few days after the tomb was found empty. They could not know who would come to be with the group and who might pull out. Bartholomew and Kelita knew they had found new ways to show their love for each other. Now they wondered whether it would be this way in the whole group.

Kelita's uncle had given them some money to purchase needed items for the trip back to Galilee. As they went into the market there might be some special things they needed to purchase instead. These articles had nothing to do with the trip home.

Bartholomew found a cloak, a simple but pretty piece of cloth for Peter. Peter had lost his in the scuffle in the Garden of Gethsemane when they arrested Jesus. In the life of a wandering evangelist, it could be a protection from the wind, or a regal show piece, or a tent or even a table covering.

For Matthias, the writer and accountant, they bought a new pen-quill for record keeping. None of the group was concerned about keeping records for later generations. Matthias only recorded some small pieces of discipleship business.

James was the rowdy one who really didn't seem to need anything. He couldn't have kept it in one piece if he had stored anything away. For him, Kelita found a gag gift, a lemon. The sour lemon might make his lips pucker so he couldn't talk so much.

For Judas, not Judas Iscariot, but the one they called the monk because he was so serious, a little carved wooden monkey, making a comic face. Everyone liked this Judas. He listened well, keeping the shared privacies to himself.

For the others there was a little of this and a little of that. Oh, what a difference a few hours can make. Earlier today they were crying. They worried the temple or the government would catch and murder them as well. Now they were buying gag gifts for each other out of their joy.

What a difference! It was not a total change. They were still hungry. As do all the people of the world, these followers of Jesus still needed to eat.

Bartholomew and Kelita supposed they had all the money of the little community. The two of them bought several loaves of bread and some wine. The new harvest had just come in, and the wine had no time to ferment and age properly. It just happened to be the cheapest available, so they bought it with their precious hoard of coins. No one knew how long these coins must last. But this was a special occasion. It called for celebration.

Bartholomew and Kelita left the market feeling good about their treasures. They laughed about the gifts they were making. They joked about the changes in their lives. They carried their sack of treasures slowly toward the meeting place outside town. Oh, it would be a good day! They would be together again. The ability to touch each other with hands and eyes and voice would renew them. To distribute the gifts would feel awfully good later in their nostalgia.

As they came to the city gate, an old woman sat huddled in rags. Poor, dirty, homeless, probably very cold at night, she looked pitiful. Bartholomew and Kelita stopped talking as they came near to her. It was as if they really did not have anything to say to each other just now. They knew each other's thoughts. Perhaps there was a better use for at least one of the gifts.

Peter, the rock, the hard one, wouldn't really need the cloak. He could be warmed with some rags and some hugs until they were all back in Galilee. Besides, in Galilee lots of young women waited to make a new cloak for Peter. He was eligible, you know. The cloak spread nicely over the woman.

Down the road under a tree, an aging rabbi sat with a young student. He was teaching the young man the skill of writing and reading. The new writer struggled with a bit of chalk stone on a hard clay tablet. A piece of scroll and worn-out quill lay beside him. Too many hours of pressure from untrained fingers had made it unusable.

When Bartholomew and Kelita walked on, the young man was the shocked and amazed owner of a fine quill. Matthias would be too busy for a time to do much writing. Besides, the quill would probably be broken before they returned to Galilee anyway.

Now the day was growing hot from the noon time sun. At the first water hole they passed, a family milled about desperately. The small children cried with throats so parched from the desert heat they could scarcely utter a sound. The parents had counted on there being water here, but as water holes will do sometimes, the hole was dry.

Kelita placed the lemon on the ground and then kneaded it with her foot to break the juice free. Then she took Bartholomew's knife and cut the lemon in half and squeezed half into her own water bag and half into Bartholomew's. Now not only was there water for the family, it was a drink fit for royalty. The children and parents drank their fill. Bartholomew whispered they could probably get another lemon for James. James really needed a lemon, sometimes. He really ought to have one. Perhaps this one was too ripe.

Bartholomew was beginning to notice the bag of gifts was not as heavy as it had been. He could walk a little easier now.

Down the road a small boy walked slowly along, in tow behind his mother. Giant tears ran down his face. These were tears such as only a small child can shed. When a Roman chariot ran over a puppy, it was real tragedy. It was just an accident. The puppy just got away from its master as puppies do. It ran out into the road. The charioteer stopped and tried to help the puppy, but it was no use. The puppy was just hurt too badly.

It was Bartholomew's turn. Ah, yes, the little monkey making the funny face. It wasn't quite the same as the puppy, but it did seem to help.

One by one the rest of the gifts made their way out of the sack on Bartholomew's back into the hands of strangers. Finally there was left only one loaf of bread and the wine.

Bartholomew and Kelita talked about this a little. They thought about Jesus who had given and given and given until he had nothing left to give but his life.

Later that night, the disciples and the others gathered to talk about Jesus. They wondered aloud about what had happened to them since the empty tomb was found. They talked about the people they had met and about what might have happened to Jesus.

Someone read the words of Moses about the victory of the Lord. Somehow Jesus was sitting there among them. Somehow, some way, his presence neither really surprised or shocked them. It was almost as if they would expect just such a thing from this Jesus.

Then Jesus said the strangest thing. "I am hungry. I have not tasted food for three days. Do you have anything to eat? It would not take much. Perhaps a little bread and wine."

All there was to eat was the dried loaf of bread and the small skin of wine Bartholomew and Kelita brought from Jerusalem. Bartholomew laid the bread on the small table. He poured the wine into Elijah's Cup which stood waiting for the return of the prophet.

Kelita said "Jesus, three days ago, when we were last together, you took the bread and broke it and blessed it. You passed it out to all of us and said `This is my body broken for you. Take this and eat it.' Then you passed the cup, Elijah's Cup, for all of us to share and you said `This is my blood poured out for you and for many.'”

“Now I also remember another thing you said one day. You said whenever we do something toward the least of the children of the Lord, we do it also to you. Perhaps now I understand."